Milan Laser Hair Removal Built A 400-Location Chain By Rejecting The Traditional Med-Spa Model

Laser hair removal has been one of aesthetics’ most commoditized services: sold in discounted packages, marketed through aggressive promotions and offered almost everywhere from local med-spas to national chains.

Milan Laser Hair Removal has built the largest dedicated laser hair removal business in the United States by doing the opposite. The Omaha-based company, which now operates over 400 locations across 38 states, focuses exclusively on laser hair removal and structures the business around a lifetime-treatment model rather than session packages.

“We’re not a med-spa that also does laser. We are the laser hair removal specialists full stop,” says CMO Christy Sherrick.  She adds, “Focus becomes even more powerful as you scale.”

The strategy has helped transform a transactional beauty service into a longer-term customer relationship business, one centered less on discounting and more on trust, consistency and predictable outcomes. Investors have bought in. Milan received private equity backing from Leonard Green & Partners in 2019, when the company had roughly 50 locations. In 2023, it received strategic growth investments from Sixth Street and Wildcat Capital Management, with Leonard Green retaining a majority stake alongside the co-founders, physicians and friends Shikhar Saxena and Abe Schumacher.

Milan explored an IPO in 2021, but it was withdrawn. Last year, former Milan CFO and Orangetheory Fitness executive Clint Weiler became CEO.

Laser hair removal has typically been sold in packages of several sessions such as five or 10 or through a pay-as-you-go model. Milan, however, has inverted that model with a single upfront price for lifetime treatments it calls The Unlimited Package. Milan doesn’t publicly list pricing for The Unlimited Package, but online customer quotes indicate prices can reach into the five figures.

“It isn’t a promotion; it’s a different business model,” says Sherrick. “It removes the single biggest barrier to purchase uncertainty about how many sessions someone will ultimately need.”

Milan contends the model fundamentally reshapes the company’s economics. Rather than optimizing for short-term revenue per visit, Milan emphasizes that the model is oriented toward lifetime customer value, forcing discipline around customer acquisition cost, retention and treatment efficiency.

“The most important metric is the relationship between customer acquisition cost and lifetime value,” says Sherrick. “Growth only matters if it’s profitable growth, so we spend significant time ensuring we’re acquiring the right clients at the right cost, and that the long-term value of those relationships justifies the investment.”

That approach stands in contrast to much of the med-spa market. According to the American Med Spa Association, the United States is home to more than 10,000 medical spas, 81% of which are single-location businesses, underscoring a fragmented industry where profitability is uneven, at least in part, due to discounting, inconsistent utilization and churn. Industry sources estimate average med-spa profit margins generally range from 20% to 25%, with high-performing operators sometimes exceeding 40%.

“Focus becomes even more powerful as you scale.”

Milan has been repositioning laser hair removal away from discretionary beauty and toward functional utility. While injectables and many device-based treatments require ongoing maintenance, laser hair removal delivers a more permanent outcome, aligning with a broader consumer shift toward simplification and lasting solutions.

Sherrick says, “When a solution permanently removes a recurring routine, it stops feeling like a discretionary beauty treatment and starts feeling more like a quality-of-life upgrade.” 

The positioning differentiates Milan from competitors like LaserAway and Ideal Image, which have broader treatment menus encompassing multiple aesthetic categories. Think Botox, filler and radio frequency skin tightening. Milan stresses its specialization in laser hair removal enables deeper expertise, rigorous training and refined treatment protocols. Milan highlights that its treatments are performed by licensed medical professionals under physician oversight, using uniform protocols and a single device platform throughout its network of locations.

Sherrick says, “Our providers perform laser treatments all day, every day, which creates a level of clinical consistency that simply can’t be matched in a multi-service environment…That structure ensures clients receive the same level of care whether they walk into their first treatment or their ninth and whether they’re in clinic No. 1 or clinic No. 400.” She continues, “When you combine The Unlimited Package, deep specialization and a medical model built for quality and results, clients see Milan Laser as a long-term partner in their treatment journey rather than simply a place to purchase individual sessions.”

Clinical consistency is particularly significant in aesthetics, where outcomes can fluctuate considerably between providers and locations. It becomes an even greater asset as Milan expands into new markets, where brand awareness and word of mouth may precede physical presence. Milan’s owner-operated rather than franchised approach is pivotal to maintaining consistent treatment protocols and customer experiences. The company reports more than 144,000 client reviews with a 4.9-star average rating.

Sherrick describes Milan’s marketing strategy as a “full-court press” centered on tracking lead quality, conversion performance and demand shifts across markets. The granularity is beneficial for a multi-location model, where small differences in conversion or acquisition cost can materially impact profitability. A key metric at Milan is lead-to-sold conversion rate, which captures both consumer demand and operational execution.

Sherrick says, “A location with strong conversion is getting the right clients in the door and closing them, which tells you The Unlimited Package value proposition is landing and the clinic team is executing well.”

As Milan grows, the priority shifts from growth to durability. For Sherrick, that means proactively evolving the hair removal business before competitors do. “Winning the category is not about protecting a position,” she says. “It’s about continuously raising the standard for what the experience, the outcomes and the trust in the category should look like.”